Don't You Cry
by CouslandSpitFire
Summary: As a child Alistair has a melody in the back of his head he cannot quite ignore and yet it starts to fade away slowly. It is a stupid melody anyways and grown boys don't need lullabies, he figures.


_Don't You Cry_

There is a melody Alistair cannot get out of his mind for some reason. A soft humming in the back of his head that softly puts him too sleep when the night grows too dark or the shadows too thick. He doesn't know where it comes from, much less does he recognize the voice that surfaces sometimes, forming words. That nearly never happens anyways and lately it occurs less and less. He is forgetting without even knowing whom.

_Hush-a-bye, don't you cry,_

_Go to sleep little baby._

Lying in the hay, he stares up to the roof, watches the dust corns dance in the ray of light that fell through a tiny hole. It just won't go away, this melody, and sometimes he is thankful for that. He likes to imagine he remembers it from much, much earlier.

_When you wake, you'll have cake,_

_And all the pretty little horses._

Sometimes he pretends it was his mother, who has sung it for him when he was a baby. He likes to think it was before she died and he was alone, likes to think that at some point somebody has been there to sing him a lullaby. Most of all, he likes to think it was not always like this, he has not always gone to bed alone in a dark chamber above the stables that only grows darker as the night progresses.

_Black and bay, dapple and grey,_

_Coach and six little horses._

Maybe she liked coming to the stables, too, to watch the horses. There are some brown ones and grey ones, even a dapple one. He likes one bay best, because he is calm and tender and bows its head to be patted when you walk past. They call him Rabbit for some reason Alistair still doesn't understand, but he knows he likes that one the best. Maybe his mother has liked horses, too. Maybe there is something more than the amulet around his neck she has left him.

_Hush-a-bye, don't you cry,_

_Go to sleep little baby._

_Hush-a-bye, don't you cry,_

_Go to sleep little baby._

Except that the voice he hears sometimes over the humming is not a woman's, it sounds much more like a man's, so maybe, he thinks, maybe his father has held him once and sung to him. But secretly he knows that that is not possible, because they say his father died long before he was born and never once saw him. They say his father died in some war. Nobody knows which one. Alistair is good at forgetting that, though. If he forgets that for some moments, he can pretend to think that it really was his father singing to him. He's almost good enough to believe himself.

_When you wake, you'll have cake,_

_And all the pretty little horses._

But slowly that voice is fading and all he can hear is the humming and his own voice as he tries to sing along. He wonders how long he will be able to remember it, how long until all he has left is the amulet around his neck that is nothing and everything at the same time.

He walks through the village and watches the other children and they don't seem to care much about silly little lullabies. They wiggle out of their mothers' grasps and beg for just ten more minutes before they need to go home. They groan and sigh and mope when they are ushered back into their houses, back into their beds. At first they laugh at him, because he is sleeping in a stable with horses and there is hay in his hair and mud on his trousers. Then they envy him, because he tells them he can go to bed whenever he wants. He tells them that sometimes he stays awake until midnight and that he hunts ghosts during dusk and fights the lake-monster at night, when everybody else is fast asleep. Some believe him, most don't. One boy doesn't venture near the lake for weeks.

_Way down yonder, down in the meadow,_

_There's a poor wee little lamby._

When he walks through the village at nightfall, he hears low murmuring and quiet laughter. He hears children cry and sometimes he hears mothers sing. They sing different lullabies, though, always different ones, never his lullaby. As the voice finally fades, he figures that it is a stupid lullaby anyways. There is no cake and there are no lambs in the meadow and not even a black horse in the whole stable. He is getting to old for lullabies. He doesn't need them.

_The bees and the butterflies pickin' at its eyes,_

_The poor wee thing cried for her mammy._

So when he lies awake at night and stares up at the roof, he listens to the shuffling of hooves and the soft breathing of the horses. He concentrates on the smells – hay, leather, horse, grain, sometimes rain and earth. Despite that in the end he will hum it to himself ultimately, will form the words tonelessly with his lips, even though it's a stupid lullaby and there are no cakes or lambs or pretty little horses for him.

He doesn't go to the castle often anymore and when he does, he makes sure to be quiet and stay in the shadows, so the lady doesn't see him too soon. He only goes there when he must and he keeps quiet, because it is too big and too cold. There is something oddly familiar about it, though, about the smell and the way the stone feels under his fingers.

_Hush-a-bye, don't you cry,_

_Got to sleep little baby._

There are cries in the castle now, though, a baby's cries, and Alistair flinches at how shrill they sound. He tiptoes his way out of the castle each time. Only once he gives in and follows his curiosity to catch a peek at that baby. Connor they call it, Wolf Kin. The little bundle doesn't really look like much. Mostly he just cries and eats and there is really nothing special about it. He hears steps drawing nearer, sees the Arl move to pick it up and he slinks back into the shadows. There is murmuring and the cries grow fainter and then he hears the Arl's voice, quiet and reassuring, soft and rough at the same time. Alistair turns to leave and almost reaches the gate before he can hear the melody and the voice that drifts to his ears as the words are sung.

"_When you wake, you'll have cake,_

_And all the pretty little horses_."

...

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I just felt in a bit of a sad mood and generally had the idea in the back of my head for a longer time, to use a children's lullaby for something like this. I don't know how well known this one is as I really only know Austrian lullabies, so I just chose one that seemed to fit somehow. I hope this isn't too bad and at least creates a bit of atmosphere - and hopefully the ending brought what I hope it did. Should I dare to write another one, I sure hope it'll be happier than this one. I think Alistair needs a serious hug. And cake. Much cake!


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